The New Archies (1987)
First episode title: The Visitor / Ballot Box Blues
How familiar with the show am I?: I knew of the Archie characters but didn't know about this specific cartoon.
I get the impression that Americans have all heard of Archie Comics, but it's not as well known over here in the UK. Archie Andrews is a comic book character from 1941 who has been consistently appearing in comics ever since, and the franchise has several animated adaptations. The comic is best known for the love triangle between Archie, Betty, and Veronica. It got some more attention recently because of the live-action TV adaptation "Riverdale". Anyway, this particular adaptation didn't last long.
Our first of two segments this time is "The Visitor". At school, the teacher Miss Grundy asks to see Jughead's science project. Jughead is a boy who's friends with Archie and always wears a hat cut into the shape of a crown, which, in the times when the early comics were coming out, was an actual fashion trend. Jughead's project is the "Jug-O-Matic", a machine that makes him a sandwich and puts it in his mouth, then malfunctions and gets food everywhere. That seems more like technology than science. The machine looked really impressive until it went wrong, so is Jughead meant to be a good inventor or a bad one?
Archie and a nerdy character called Eugene (what is it with that name and nerds?) are sitting at another desk. When Eugene leaves for recess, the sleepy Archie rests his head for a second and accidentally presses a switch on Eugene's own invention, a small thing with legs and a big orb on top - it comes to life, and Archie screams like a crying baby! Archie is apologetic, but he, Eugene, and Jughead now go chasing after it as it escapes out of the window.
Eugene: That's a sophisticated piece of technology, with computerised circuitry, and compatible laser beam capabilities!
Jughead: What's it do, Eugene?
Eugene: Do? I haven't decided that yet!
Ah, the "eccentric inventor" type. Throughout all this they're still pursuing the machine along the street, until it hits a tree and seems to break down... but then the orb at the top opens and a big blaster thing comes out, and shoots a laser up into space! Cut to an interplanetary highway where several spaceships are all heading along the same route, and the laser hits one of them, shocking the pink, antenna-ed alien inside! If you thought this would be an ordinary show about kids at school, you were wrong, at least for this segment!
The spaceship gets dragged down to Earth by the laser beam. Yes, Eugene has somehow made an invention that abducts aliens! The spaceship crashes in front of the boys, who are of course surprised, but the surprise doesn't seem to last very long. Jughead calls the alien a "weird little dude", and the alien immediately fixates on the word "dude", repeating it over and over - consequently, from now on, the boys refer to him as Dude. Archie apologises for the damage to the spaceship, which now has smoke coming out of it, and promises to help get Dude back home. Like many of these kinds of shows, where the main character is often the least interesting person in the show and the funniest things are what's happening around them, the most obvious personality trait you can assign to Archie is that he's a good person.
To try and pass him off as a normal human, they take him to Archie's house and put a shirt on him, as well as Jughead's hat to cover his antennae - Jughead complains that he feels naked without it. It's a bit weird though - Dude's normal design has three antennae, one on the top and one on each side. When he's wearing the crown, the top one is covered, and the other two seem to retract? We can just see the ends of them. So he couldn't do that with the top one? Anyway, even with the disguise, he's hard to mistake for a human.
Next we're in the school gym, where some boys are practising basketball, and the girls, Betty and Veronica, are cheerleading. Ouch, the gender roles here.
Betty: Give me an R, give me an I, give me-
Veronica: Give me a break...
Betty: What's wrong, Roni?
Veronica: By the time we spell out "Riverdale", the game'll be over! We need a shorter town.
Archie and Dude come in, Archie excusing his lateness (remember, he was in school when all this started!) by claiming he was showing "Jughead's cousin" around the school. You can tell by his hat that they're related! A boy called Reggie, who is a rival to Archie, bullies Dude by throwing a ball at him, but then Archie absolutely thrashes Reggie at basketball.
The girls start up their chant again, this time spelling out A-R-C-H-I-E, and this attracts Dude's attention - he gets love hearts in his eyes and goes rushing towards Betty, grabbing onto her, and she tells him to let go. If he wasn't the size of a small child this would look like harrassment - remember, he can drive a spaceship! Veronica isn't jealous, instead mocking Betty for getting such an unattractive admirer. Again, the idea that he might not even be a human doesn't cross her mind.
Since Veronica mentions that Betty is usually attracted to basketball players, Dude rushes onto the playing area to try and join in, dribbling past a load of players that seem to have shown up from nowhere in order to score. Then he tries his hand at defending against Reggie, and he shoots a kind of laser beam out of his hand that lifts Reggie into the air and tosses him at the hoop, which shows off his alien powers and stuff but doesn't exactly seem to stop Reggie from scoring? Nevertheless, the coach is impressed, calling Dude's abilities... "out of this world". Groan.
Back at Archie's house, Eugene has fixed Dude's spaceship, but it's out of fuel, and when they ask Dude what he uses for fuel, he says "feltzig". The boys have no idea what this is, but my immediate prediction was that it must be something easily obtainable on Earth. Just to make the plot resolvable, you know? Dude, worried he might not get back, sadly takes out a triangular device on which he views a picture of his family. I wish we got to see more of this device - does it just do pictures, or is this an alien smartphone?
Wait, I guess it's not a phone. Otherwise he could... you know.
As Archie and Dude leave to look for some feltzig, we learn that Reggie has been hiding around a corner, and now he knows that Dude is an alien! I don't know why exactly he was spying on Archie's house, but maybe something about being tossed in the air by an invisible force made him suspicious of Dude. He gets a vision of flying coins around his head, and dashes off. The next we see, he and Veronica are peering into the window of "Pop's Video Cafe", the local hang-out, and they spot Archie and Dude inside.
Veronica: There he is!
Reggie: There it is.
Reggie needs to learn to respect people's pronouns. Then Reggie tells Veronica that Veronica's dad owns a research laboratory without even bothering to make the exposition sound natural, and suggests that her dad would be in all the headlines if he had a live alien specimen - both Veronica and Reggie then each imagine themselves on the cover of the newspaper instead. Veronica is meant to be one of Archie's potential love interests but she doesn't come off as very likeable. That's probably the whole point.
Archie asks Pop, the balding man with a moustache who owns the place, where he can get some feltzig.
Pop: I sell cheeseburgers, tacos, and pizza! Try the feltzig store.
In writing that comes off a little sarcastic, so I should clarify that he's chuckling in a fatherly kind of way as he says it. He didn't have to humour Archie, so he seems like a guy to look up to. Meanwhile, Dude is looking at the arcade games in the cafe, including a game called "Space Way" where a spaceship is firing at some asteroids - Dude enthusiastically shoots a laser from his own finger at the arcade cabinet, blowing it up (but not even leaving a mark on the next cabinet over). There are some reactions in this show that come off as very 80s anime, and Dude has one when the game blows up, briefly giving him blank white eyes. It adds some variety to what would otherwise be quite a generically animated show.
Veronica goes up to Dude and claims that she saw Betty outside - Dude, with hearts in his eyes, rushes out there, straight into a big bag that Reggie is holding! Mean trick. Veronica does show some sympathy to Dude as they put the bag in the basket of a three-person bike, with the rear seat taken by Smithers, who must be a butler to Veronica's family and is therefore doing everything she tells him to. All he ever says is "As you wish, Miss Veronica" every time she gives him an order.
Archie starts chasing them on his skateboard. Dude pops up out of the bag, and when he sees a hamburger stand he starts shouting "feltzig"! Yes, feltzig is hamburgers, which raises so many questions about life on Dude's planet - the animals, the invention of the sandwich, why they'd use that as vehicle fuel instead of food... Archie shouts out the new discovery to Eugene (fixing the spaceship) and Jughead (relaxing in the spaceship's seat) as he passes, and Jughead, who happens to be eating a burger, puts it in the machine, causing it to take off with him in it! It doesn't seem very useful for a vehicle to immediately take off once it has some fuel in it. He should need to start it first!
So Jughead goes zooming around, while Veronica tells Smithers to speed up as Archie continues to chase them. But then Betty just happens to be walking by! Dude leaps from the bag to jump into her arms again - he could leave the whole time? - but before he can plant a kiss on her cheek, Archie grabs him, and Dude ends up accidentally kissing Archie instead, looking very shocked that he's done so! Judging by the picture of Dude's family from earlier, his species have the same male/female gender binary that an 80s cartoon would assume that humans have, and they're presumably straight by default too. Shame.
The frustrated Veronica tells Smithers to take her to her dad anyway, and Jughead just about lands the spaceship outside Pop's. Archie shows up to order the feltzig - I do like how the first thing Pop mentioned when asked about feltzig was his burgers, and now that's what they're using - and Pop brings him a big pile of them to dump into the spaceship. They put Dude into the seat ready to leave, and then Dude remembers to give Jughead's hat back - in contrast to how he felt earlier, Jughead says he almost forgot about it! It just looks right on Dude's head, you know? Archie never asks for his shirt back, though... And Dude sheds a tear as he takes off. Aww.
They wave goodbye as the spaceship leaves, just in time, as a limo shows up carrying Veronica with her father and Reggie.
Mr Lodge: Alright, Veronica, I'm a very busy man, now where's this space creature you told me about?
Veronica tells Archie and Jughead to show him Dude, and they play dumb, calling each other "dude" and greeting Veronica's father like they're the only "dudes" around. Veronica continues to insist there really was an alien in a flying saucer as her father angrily orders her and Reggie back into the car and drives off. As always, it is lovely to see the horrible ones get what they deserve.
The last scene of the segment is Archie, at night, looking into the starry sky and saying "Welcome home, Dude". Which to me is what you'd say to someone who's come home to where you are, not to someone who's gone off to their home somewhere else, but whatever.
Second segment: Ballot Box Blues. Archie's house. Archie's unseen mother tells him he's going to be late for school. Wow, this really is an anime. Archie runs out of the house with his skateboard and books, and he trips over his dog, Red. Archie, apparently blaming the dog for him not looking where he was going, says that he doesn't have time to play and skates off, not noticing that he's left behind a bag - his lunch? Red sees it and barks. At least, I suppose it's meant to be a bark. The way he barks sounds more like a kind of shriek! He picks up the bag and tries to catch up to Archie, but ends up rolling down the street and crashing into a fire hydrant.
Red picks the bag back up and jumps onto Archie's face, sticking there, so now Archie can't see where he's skating! A passing Jughead is strolling along listening to music on headphones, and Archie ends up picking him up too, heading straight into school that way. Jughead doesn't seem bothered at all, continuing to groove to his music as he's carried into school!
In class, Miss Grundy is collecting people's homework. When she reaches Reggie, who we can assume hasn't done it, he pretends to look for it in his bag, until a distraction arrives in the form of Archie, Red, and Jughead all bursting through the door on one skateboard. They collide with Miss Grundy, scattering homework papers, and Reggie briefly pretends that one is his until a big, tough kid called Moose points out that it says M-O-O-S-E on it. You would assume Moose is a nickname, but it's the name he uses on his homework, at least! And the teacher also calls Jughead "Jughead" even in school. Perhaps they don't want to confuse us with multiple names for the characters.
The skateboard trip ended in the classroom closet, and there is some business with the trio coming out of there wearing various coats, and with Red initially sitting at a desk along with the boys until he's ordered out of the classroom. When asked his name, Red does his cute little shriek again.
Grundy announces that today is the day they elect a class president, so she starts asking around for candidates. Reggie wants to know how much it pays, so he's out. Jughead ignores the question and continues listening to his music, even when the teacher briefly removes his headphones! Is this trying to tell us something about the kids of today? The kids of today forty years ago, I mean.
Grundy asks Betty and Veronica, and they both say there's no way they'd be able to run against each other, but then each of them fantasises about what it would be like to be class president. Betty seems to think it's the same as being president, being cheered on by a crowd and driven around in a limo chauffeured by Archie, who tells her he likes her more than he likes Veronica now. But Veronica's fantasy is even less accurate, making her seem like a princess, with a big mansion and a horse-drawn carriage, and Archie and Reggie both ready to do anything she wants! Miss Grundy has apparently been standing around waiting for their fantasies to end this whole time, asking again if they want to run, and this time they both say yes.
Betty and Veronica have a conversation where Betty promises to vote for Veronica, and Veronica uses her own twisted logic to explain why she'll still be voting for herself. Then later in the playground, Veronica tries to get Archie to help her get votes, but he's already promised Betty he'd campaign for her, so Reggie comes over and says he'll campaign for Veronica. There's too much pointless filler in these two conversations - this little paragraph covers a couple of minutes of the episode and I couldn't find anything more interesting to say, because it's giving me nothing to work with. Luckily the whole show isn't like that.
Betty and Veronica both set up their campaigns in the playground, attracting crowds of children:
Neither of them get off to a good start. Reggie tells Veronica to think about what she's good at, and she says she's only good at shopping. Archie tells Betty to make some campaign promises, and she promises more spinach at the cafeteria, driving kids away in disgust. Stupid kids - spinach is nice!
Then Veronica starts promising to give her voters some of her millionaire father's money. So Betty asks her crowd what they want, the girls start saying that they want a headband like hers, and Archie somehow has a box of them ready to start throwing into the crowd. Hilariously, Reggie starts accusing them of "buying votes".
Veronica goes off to talk to her father - this is all during recess, right? - while Reggie tries to sabotage Betty's campaign his own way. He secretly ties a rope to the little wagon that Betty is using as a podium, and ties the other end to a merry-go-round. Then he asks Moose, who has apparently forgotten all about being mad at Reggie, to give him a push on the merry-go-round. Of course, Moose is so strong that Reggie himself goes flying, into a fountain where Jughead is relaxing, still listening to music like he has been since the start of the day. But the plan works, as the rope suddenly pulls Betty away from her followers, just in time for Veronica to show up with a van full of designer jeans for the girls and baseball jackets for the boys. That's a weird gender binary. I'm pretty sure boys wear jeans too.
Next, Archie is strapped to a kite, held up by Moose, to do some skywriting. Moose questions why Archie has written "Vote for Belly", and Archie realises he's forgotten to cross the Ts. That would work great if lower case letters were involved, but it's been animated with the text in all caps, making it look more like "VOTE FOR BEIIY" with two Is. Still, I love the phrase "Vote for Belly". Veronica is jealous that she didn't get Archie on her campaign, as Reggie, just about balancing on a big ladder, puts up a banner on the school building that says "Vote for Veronica".
Betty is talking to Eugene about an invention of his, a kind of paint gun that should enable them to paint several Vote for Betty signs in "milliseconds", which feels like the writers trying to make his speech fancy without any concept of how short a time a millisecond is. At least he didn't say "nanoseconds". I do love how eccentric they made him though - when Betty asks why they can't just use a paintbrush, he said he never thought of that! Betty gives the paint gun a go, and it's got way too much pressure, shooting her through the air and splattering Eugene. On her way past Jughead, who's leaning against a wall and still listening to music, she covers him in paint and he walks away, leaving a perfect Jughead-shaped gap in the paint on the wall! Crown and all!
Then everything starts to happen at once. Moose, distracted by a fly, lets go of the kite; Veronica gets splattered by paint as Betty flies past; Moose, trying to grab the kite's string, knocks over the ladder, but Reggie grabs the banner and ends up gliding with it, inadvertently picking up Veronica on his way past. I love the part where Archie is yelling "Help!" while also spelling out the word "Help" in skywriting. Archie, Betty, and Reggie and Veronica all collide in the air and land together in a sandpit. You know I love scenes where all the chaos that's been going on in a cartoon comes together in one big finale, so this really appeals to me.
Back in class, all of those four are dishevelled and covered in paint, and Betty and Veronica have both chosen to withdraw from the election, preferring to be friends. Archie and Reggie also seem to be friends now, which there was never any previous sign of and which I doubt stayed true in subsequent episodes. No-one had been able to decide between Betty and Veronica anyway, and in the end, the only ballot in the box was Jughead's one, which he had signed his own name on, presumably completely absent-mindedly. Miss Grundy tries to declare Jughead the winner, but he's asleep at his desk and still has his headphones on, so he has no idea what's happening, but the whole class cheers his victory anyway! Jughead is class president! Wanna bet that didn't stay true in any later episodes either?
Overall, this wasn't a bad cartoon. I liked the alien half better than the election half. If I were to compare it to some of the other "school-age kids getting up to mischief" shows we've had on here so far, I like it more than Little Lulu (of course), less than Dennis and Gnasher and Hey Arnold!, and about the same as It's Punky Brewster.